Global Art 9/21/22

Agustus follows the end of the Roman Republic 509-27 BCE

He was adopted by Julius Caesar
Returns to Rome after Caesar’s murder at 19
- Platform of expansion
- Return to religious values
- Communal values

Aeneid was written during the time of Agustus and was Virgil’s patron

Agustus
(r. 27 BCE - 14 CE)
- Wanted to reassure people that continuity was key, despite the dramatically different
government from republic to empire
- He also promised lasting peace, which he delivered on after years of civil wars,
corruption and drama
Prima Porta
- Thought the original was of bronze
- Thought that this marble copy was originally made for a family member

Romans collected sculptures from Ancient Greece

Two pasts that Agustus is trying to emulate:
- Roman Republic
- Perikles’ Athens

Return to PP:
- Stance
- Armor
- Cupid Support
- Feet
- Face
-
- Classism:
- Focus on naturalism, held in balance with ideas of proportion and standards

Doryphoros (Spearbearer) by Polykleitos, Roman marble copy of a Greek (bronze) original of c.

440 BCE
- Proportions are “perfect”
- Contrapposto stance

Most people would have seen the Prima Porta as a reference to this statue
- Can keep the empire in balance
- Harkens back to Greek culture and return to old values
- Jarring having your leader in marble nearby
- He doesn’t exactly copy though, just references features
- Has a representation of Cupid on the corner
- Wears armor (fitting for a politician)
- Right hand up as if to address a crowd
- The breastplate:
- Paullini states that there is a representation of the defeat of a force that
previously defeated that took their standard
- Left figure could be Agustus, Romulus, or a general Roman person
- Right fig Parthean: dressed different bearded scraggly hair holds the standard
- He got the standards back through diplomacy: threatened war and talked the
Partheans to death until they gave them back
- Back of the statue
- The back looks unfinished, not meant to be seen from this side
- Support column due to the weight and structure of marble
- Cupid used to disguise column
- Cupid is also a reference to Venus, who Caesar’s family claimed dependency
- Agustus at Brown
- Copy of a copy, doesn’t need column, but has it vestigially
- Bare feet
- Doesn’t need shoes for he is above menial tasks that would require them
- COLOR
- Head of Agustus-portraiture
- Depicted in his youth, when he took power
- Previous tradition of Veristic Republican portraits; Early 1st c. BCE
- Wrinkled implies honesty and wisdom
- Break from rule of Rome by old men
- Trust me I’m young
- Underscore divinity
- What he first seizes is reference of portraiture of the military hero Alexander
- Agustus as a civic ruler and as a pontifex or priest
- People carved bases and tops for pontifex, and then a face placed inside
- Mediated visual communications dispersed through the empire
- Statues in Egypt, germany, and Gaul
- “I found Rome brick and left it marble”
- Commissioned aqueducts, theaters, public spaces and temples (Took many obelisks
from Egypt)
- Ara Pacis
- Raised altar was the host of processions
- Members of Agustus’ extended family
- Campus Martius
- New field of war dedicated to peace and urban
- All the buildings sank as it was built on a floodplain
- House of Agustus
- Had a single house to emphasis that he was “first among many”